Author Topic: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]  (Read 1193 times)

ChpBstrd

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401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« on: February 01, 2020, 08:23:16 AM »
My employer changed 401(k) plan administrators with the new year. At EOY, I had $152k in the old plan in a blended stock/bond fund. My employer explained to us it would be the end of January before we could get into our new accounts with Voya. OK, fine.

During early January, the market soared. The S&P went from 3229 on Jan 2 to 3320 on Jan 21. I could only speculate how my 401k funds were doing. I wondered how much my comparable blended fund would go up if the stock market rose 2.8%?

As it turns out, Voya had kept my 401k funds in cash until Jan 21, which happened to be the peak for the month. On that day, they dumped 100% of my funds into a 100% stock fund. Today, the S&P is down 2.9%, back where we started the month at around 3225.

So I lost about $4400 without doing anything simply because my plan administrator delayed investment.

There is a market timing lesson here and a lump sum investing lesson here. But I'm mostly bitching because I think Bob the world's worst market timer is running my 401(k).

chasesfish

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #1 on: February 01, 2020, 08:34:59 AM »
Voya sucks...

EricEng

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #2 on: February 02, 2020, 12:16:16 AM »
My company just switched away from Voya.  Funny to hear about people switching to them.  That's interesting they changed the assets you were invested in.  Our's just transferred them over without ever being in cash.

MustacheAndaHalf

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #3 on: February 02, 2020, 01:10:39 AM »
Don't forget to go to your company's contact / 401(k) admin, whining and griping about what happened.  I'm also curious what range of expense ratios are available in a Voya 401(k).  When I hear "Voya" I think of expense ratios over 1%, and 121-b fees where your assets pay for Voya's advertising.

chasesfish

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #4 on: February 02, 2020, 09:27:59 AM »
Don't forget to go to your company's contact / 401(k) admin, whining and griping about what happened.  I'm also curious what range of expense ratios are available in a Voya 401(k).  When I hear "Voya" I think of expense ratios over 1%, and 121-b fees where your assets pay for Voya's advertising.

Yes.

My consulting gig is with a company using Voya - They are paying well over 1% on everything because Voya passes on the costs of running a small plan to the participants.  We got over $1mil in plan assets this year and are moving away from them in Q2.   If/when we get to $3mil, we can move to an non-bundled provider and really save some money.

John Galt incarnate!

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #5 on: February 02, 2020, 02:24:38 PM »
My employer changed 401(k) plan administrators with the new year. At EOY, I had $152k in the old plan in a blended stock/bond fund. My employer explained to us it would be the end of January before we could get into our new accounts with Voya. OK, fine.

During early January, the market soared. The S&P went from 3229 on Jan 2 to 3320 on Jan 21. I could only speculate how my 401k funds were doing. I wondered how much my comparable blended fund would go up if the stock market rose 2.8%?

As it turns out, Voya had kept my 401k funds in cash until Jan 21, which happened to be the peak for the month. On that day, they dumped 100% of my funds into a 100% stock fund. Today, the S&P is down 2.9%, back where we started the month at around 3225.

So I lost about $4400 without doing anything simply because my plan administrator delayed investment.

There is a market timing lesson here and a lump sum investing lesson here. But I'm mostly bitching because I think Bob the world's worst market timer is running my 401(k).

OUCH!

Valhalla

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #6 on: February 03, 2020, 01:39:51 AM »
I'm very sorry to hear.  I lost about $1500 transferring from my old 401k to my new 401k.  It took a while to get the check (in 2020 we still use checks to roll over retirement funds??!!), and market went up during that time.

I hate trading large sums of money which exposes us to market swings.  Hopefully this will be just a small blip on your journey to FIRE!

ChpBstrd

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Re: 401k changeover cost me thousands [whining and griping]
« Reply #7 on: February 03, 2020, 08:37:54 AM »
Don't forget to go to your company's contact / 401(k) admin, whining and griping about what happened.  I'm also curious what range of expense ratios are available in a Voya 401(k).  When I hear "Voya" I think of expense ratios over 1%, and 121-b fees where your assets pay for Voya's advertising.

I don’t have my info in front of me now, but I believe I’m in their 2045 retirement fund, VTRMX (Correction: about 90% equities). Apparently they put everyone in lifecycle funds for simplicity.

The total ER is about 0.8%. As a “fund of funds” this ER includes all the ERs of the various other funds it has purchased. Its largest holding is IVV.

This is actually a modest improvement over the ERs in the Principal plan we used to have.

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!